City ordinance makes most pet rabbits illegal

Finally, here’s a story that is the perfect place to use the cliché “hopping mad.”

Debra Elliff of Houston was stunned to learn her house rabbits were illegal residents.

She received citations for having three rabbits when a BARC animal control officer saw her son playing with the rabbits in their front yard.

She was in violation of a 1968 ordinance, which designates your home as a rabbit enclosure if you have house pets and says rabbit hutches must be 100 feet from the nearest neighbor. A BARC rep says the ordinance is under review.

The whole situation outrages our Bunny Buzz blogger who is devoted to rabbit rescue and sends many bunnies to new homes in the city limits.

Les Wood, president of Bunny Buddies, says change is needed immediately because the ordinance impacts the rabbit rescue group’s effort to find homes for animals abandoned at shelters such as BARC.

“We are out every weekend pushing adoptions for rabbits to keep them from being killed in shelters, and every (rabbit) we are sending out has the potential to be getting the owner in trouble,” Wood said. “You can’t tell me there’s nobody in the city that has the authority to say: We will not enforce this, pending review.”

I think the ordinance was set up mainly for chickens because of the roosters but bunnies were added on which was just stupid.

Check this out. I found a dead possum in a box in my yard two nights ago. I don’t know why I had a box with a dead possum in my yard but I live in a weird neighborhood.

Anyway, I called 311 and asked them to pick it up. They told me it would be at least 5 days before they would pick it up. The City doesn’t work nights or weekends picking up dead possums.

I said, Can I bury it in my yard?

They said no and it was against the law to bury animals in my yard. THAT’S JUST STUPID!

Now what am I supposed to do with a dead possum in a box if I can’t bury it? I have cats. I guess I could leave the possum in the box until the middle of next week so my cats can get sick and create more problems but I don’t think so. I got rid of the possum.